In recent years, transportation methods have changed substantially. This change is due in part to a concern over the limited availability of natural resources, a proliferation in personal technology, and a societal shift to adopt more environmentally friendly transportation solutions. These considerations have encouraged the development of a number of new flexible-fuel vehicles, hybrid-electric vehicles, and electric vehicles.
While these vehicles appear to be new they are generally implemented as a number of traditional subsystems that are merely tied to an alternative power source. In fact, the design and construction of the vehicles has been limited to standard frame sizes, shapes, materials, and transportation concepts. Among other things, these limitations fail to take advantage of the benefits of new technology, power sources, and support infrastructure.
In most cases, the new vehicles do not require a number of the systems or components associated with conventional vehicle technology. In particular, many electric vehicles do not employ parts that are necessary to support a gasoline-powered infrastructure including, for example, engines, multi-speed transmissions, catalytic converters, exhaust systems, oil pumps, gas pumps, water pumps, etc. These parts and systems add significant weight, complexity, and safety concerns that are not found in electric vehicles. As can be appreciated, the overall design of a new electric vehicle can be significantly different from that of conventional vehicles.